Torn Between Enemy Alphas

Chapter 57: Cole

Cole had helped Lena and Dani get Emery out of the window, and safely on the ground, before swearing on everything holy that he wouldn't leave without Alice. He could tell that Dani wanted to go back in, but the witch couldn't carry Emery on her own and there was no way he was leaving Alice to fend for herself. It made sense that Dani would stay with her best friend and that he would stay with Alice.

He'd come to think of himself as her Beta, more and more, over the past few months. He couldn't pinpoint exactly when it had happened. He knew that he hadn't really liked her all that much on the night that Alpha Cadman had called him and Kade over and basically ordered them to fuck her.

Both he and Kade had thought it was a horrible idea. It wasn't that they weren't attracted to her. Obviously they were. But they'd known that Lane had wanted her for a long while and they'd felt like they were walking into a dangerous situation, having a taste of the Alpha's woman would ultimately lead to him resenting them.

It hadn't quite turned out that way, but Cole still thought that it had been a mistake. But that had nothing to do with why he had become so loyal to the Almost-Luna of Amber Moon. It was simply because she deserved his loyalty. She was everything that a Luna should be. The fidelity that he felt towards her wasn't sexual. It was something that his wolf and he both felt they owed her because she was truly a leader that deserved their respect. Unlike Alpha Cadman.

At the thought his wolf shoved at his mind, reminding him of what happened before the banquet and he felt his cheeks turn red at the memory. Well yes, she was undeniably attractive. He would have to be blind not to notice that. He'd noticed her before that day that Lane had demanded he and Kade come by the house, back when she'd been dating that douchebag Theo, after Luke, one of her first boyfriends found his mate.Cole remembered well enough from their time training together that Luke had really cared about her and had hoped that she would turn out to be his mate, but of course, nothing had been that easy for any of them.

Cole swung back in through the second story window. Lena said she was fairly certain that Alice was in the back bedroom in the upstairs that Alpha Cadman never used. Usually he slept with one of the girls in a large bedroom downstairs. But apparently Alice was special, even to him. Cole rolled his eyes. As if he needed to be told that.

He listened hard, finally hearing Lane's low voice coming from the next room. That was all it took. He was alone and the chances of him being able to take on whatever it was that his former Alpha had become was somewhere between impossible and yeah, right, that's gonna happen, but he couldn't leave her in there by herself, to let Lane do whatever he wanted to her.

Taking a deep breath Cole strode down the hall, and slammed open the door, just in time to see Alice hit the wall and slump to the ground, unconscious.

White hot rage, pulsed through Cole's body as he fought the urge to shift. That was coming, but not just yet. He wanted to face his former Alpha and look him in the eye first, before he did his damndest to rip out his throat.

Lane turned at the sound of the door and Cole was surprised to see that he was obviously injured, although he was healing fast now that he had half-shifted.

"Sorry Beta." Lane sneered at the other man as he said the words. "My days of sharing are over. I know you've always had a hankering after my sloppy seconds, but I'm afraid I was a bit hard on this one. Guess you'll have to see if I play nicer with my toys next time."

Cole thought his head might explode. Alice was there on the floor, slumped over, possibly seriously injured, and Alpha Cadman, who had sworn to him not a month ago that she was the love of his life and the future mother of his children, was referring to her as a toy he'd broken. Cole had always thought that the phrase "seeing red" was just a figure of speech, but for the first time in his life, he literally saw a crimson haze clouding his vision as he rushed at the other man, not quite realizing what he was doing until he had done it.

Sometimes you have to take risks for the people that you care about.

Cole knew that he couldn't defeat Alpha Cadman as a man or as a wolf. Even if he followed his lead, shifting to something in between, he probably didn't stand much of a chance at defeating his Alpha. Because there it was. Cadman would still be an Alpha, shifted into a monster, and he would still be a Beta, even if he shifted into the same thing. But at least if he did it, he'd stand a fighting chance.

Maybe, if luck was on his side, there'd be an opening. Especially since the injuries Alice appeared to have inflicted on Lane looked to be serious. Cole felt a surge of admiration for the small unconscious Luna who was still crumpled against the wall, as he thought of everything she had risked trying to save the other people inside the house.

Kade was dead and Alice would be too if he didn't win this fight. And with that in mind he prepared to shift, surging forward into his wolf form before pulling himself back at the last possible moment from fully shifting. He felt an odd snapping reverberate through his body and mind, a sensation that was caught somewhere between pain and pleasure, and when he opened his eyes again the red haze was back, covering everything that he saw. He shifted his gaze to Cadman and realized that the fear he'd felt a few moments before was gone. All he felt now was rage.

Cadman had killed his best friend. Now he was going to take the woman who should be ruling their pack. This had to end and Cole suddenly knew that he had to be the one to end it. Lunging forward he pushed everything out of his mind except destroying the Alpha he had sworn fidelity to when he first became a warrior, six years earlier. He hardly noticed the slight smirk on Lane's lips as he crouched down, readying himself for the first blow.

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When Fin came around the corner of the house, with Vos close behind him, he nearly slammed into Dani. Emery was practically hanging draped between Lena and Dani's shoulders. They were more or less carrying her while she tried to walk between them, insisting that once she caught her breath, she would be fine. The look on Lena's face told anyone who cared to see, that this wasn't the case. Emery needed a hospital and fast. The witch had been doing all she could, but the Luna needed doctors preferably of the werewolf variety, antibiotics, and then it wouldn't hurt to mix a little magic in with the rest, since this was a magical problem, but as long as the infection was raging out of control, and it had been getting more and more out of control in the past two days, there was little the witch could do to save the rapidly fading woman.

"Vos, take Emery. Get her back to Obsidian Moon and the hospital unit we have there. And send every guard you have and every warrior I have to these coordinates, now." Luca didn't show a bit of surprise at the ease with which the young Alpha gave orders as Fin's eyes locked on Lena. "He's here, isn't he?" Lena nodded, slumping over, her hands on her knees, looking as if the past weeks of working to keep Emery alive were catching up with her all at once.

"He has her. He's going to kill her, whether he means to or not. He's not even close to himself, whoever that was. His human half is almost entirely gone. My spells haven't been able to help hold him these past days. He's almost pure Beast now, if he isn't entirely one already. You need to save her. The Beta just went in after her. He's probably already dead. But I pray she isn't."

"I would know wouldn't I? Even though he severed our connection. I would know." Fin said the words more to himself than to anyone else, before turning and locking eyes with Luca, who gave him a small nod. Without a word he turned and began to climb up towards the window that Dani and Lena had just managed to escape through, praying all the while that they weren't too late.

A/N- I hope you are enjoying this story! If you are I'd love it if you'd comment and click that little star button to vote for it.

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